


falling, in moonlight

by goldfinchex



Category: Red Velvet (K-pop Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gods & Goddesses, Alternate Universe - Hellenistic Religion & Lore Fusion, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/F, Fairy Tale Elements, Greek Mythology AU, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Sexual Content, Irene is an actual goddess, Mental Health Issues, Modern God AU, References to Drugs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-16
Updated: 2019-02-16
Packaged: 2019-10-23 00:14:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,843
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17672768
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goldfinchex/pseuds/goldfinchex
Summary: "from the second that seulgi lays eyes on her, she thinks that irene is a goddess. she is not wrong."or: seulgi was running from the world and she never expected to find a fragment of a goddess before she becomes whole again.-----





	falling, in moonlight

**Author's Note:**

> TW: references to sexual violence and thoughts of dying (not _exactly _that explicit, but if you need to avoid, please do!)__

from the second that seulgi lays eyes on her, she thinks that irene is a goddess.

she is not wrong.

\-----

seulgi stumbles into the clearing and starts.

there is a figure standing in the middle of the circle – a lithe and small woman whose dark hair contrasted sharply against her dark skin, a hawk perched on her arm. some small surprise flits across her face when she spots seulgi, and she lowers her arm. seulgi catches the tawny gaze of the hawk before it flaps its wings, disappearing into the sky. 

seulgi draws close to her, this strange person – no, no, not person – and she approaches her in the forest with wide eyes. her legs hold steady. her gaze is locked onto her dark, unblinking eyes. seulgi bows deep to the goddess, tries not to stare too much at the way the moonlight glances off the smooth alabaster skin before her, firmly staring at her muddied toes, resisting the urge to bend even lower to dust the leaf off her right foot.

she asks to stay.

for a long moment, she fears that she will say no. she inhales. a sharp draw of breath. her fingers reach down and ghosts seulgi's shoulder lightly, not bothering to ask for permission. _you may stand._

"would this mean that i can join you?"

a pause.

_you may._

_\-----_

she doesn't know why irene accepts her presence. irene doesn't need her around. she stays in a small hut somewhere deep in the forest, shrouded behind thickets and trees. seulgi _knows_ that there’s nothing natural about this place. not really.

years of tutelage has taught her enough about plants, _you don’t get many shrubs on forests with a dense canopy layer because sunlight doesn’t quite reach the forest floor._ and yet. this part of the forest has trees so tall that the arboreal ceiling towers above her. and yet, dense shrubs. when she does venture out of irene’s house, a gust of wind would slap her in the face, and her feet would connect with the thick mulch of leaf litter, acting like a sinkhole each time she wanders about within the ring of undergrowth.

seulgi knows that if she is to leave, she will never be able to find her way back here without irene’s aid.

if irene will even want her back, that is.

\-----

the first few days are the strangest.

irene shows her how to wash her clothes by the stream. if she wanted to, for familiarity’s sake. nothing really got dirtier in irene’s house. when she asks irene how it was possible that no dust caked the surfaces, for she hadn’t ever seen irene try to clean anything, irene simply shrugs and says that things are such as they are.

there’s not a lot to do, not really. irene spends her days in the forest, leaving seulgi alone for the most part once she’s sure that seulgi wouldn’t somehow burn the house down using the wooden stove. seulgi’s not even sure that the house would burn, but she didn’t want to try  to risk irene’s wrath. seulgi spends her days napping, the languid ease of being there seeping into her veins.

that, or she draws. she found a sketchpad filled with doodles in a drawer, and asked irene if she could draw too. the next day, irene presents to her a sketchpad and a few long sticks of charcoal.

irene prefers to spend her time in the forest, lying next to the deer in the shadows or flitting off into the forest with her bow and arrow. seulgi wonders if she should ask to join her. but then again, she didn’t bring her glasses with her and shooting irene by accident isn’t at the top of her priorities.

there are days where irene surprises her and asks her for her company. they venture out together to where the trees don’t tower over them and sit on the grass. seulgi finds out quite quickly that irene likes it when she sings, so it is in such expeditions that seulgi scrambles for any lyrics that she’s committed to memory. it’s worth it, she thinks, when all seulgi can think is how warm the sun makes her skin feels and how warm irene’s light smiles makes her insides feel. or the way irene’s small fingers threads through seulgi’s hair to braid it. some days, when irene’s feeling up to it, she braids daisies into seulgi’s hair.

\-----

"have you always lived alone?" irene's mouth curls downwards into a slight frown, her head cocking to the side as she answers, _no, not really._

"not really?" by now, she's become used to irene's short answers. irene isn't much in the way of words. she's never heard her say anything aloud. she wonders if she _can_ speak. as it is, irene’s simply taciturn most of the time. which suits seulgi just fine. she doesn’t need to talk that much, anyway.

but well, it would have been nice to hold a proper conversation one day soon.

irene sighs. _it’s_ _been a long time._

“try me.”

irene stares at her, her large eyes blinking before she lets out a bark of laughter. the sound escapes from her in a harsh, and raw sound, and seulgi would call it _derisive_ on anyone else but on irene? no. a small burst of pity rises in her when she guesses that it’s been _forever_ since irene had last laughed. _a long time,_ perhaps.

 _i used to live with my sisters,_ irene muses. _they would come and stay with me, something like you, perhaps. wanting an escape from the world outside. and my brother would come visiting, sometimes._

“does he still come? your brother?”

irene frowns again. _it’s not been for some time._

“do you miss him?”

her frown deepens. _i don’t know._

“who was the last person you saw, before me?”

 _him. now he doesn’t come. not anymore._ then she looks as if she’s considering before the next question sounds, _i suppose if missing him means whether i wonder he will come here again, then yes._

“how does he know that you’re here? Maybe he’s tried to search in other places. maybe he thinks you’d have left here by now.”

 _believe me_ , _he would know where i am._

“that _must_ mean you know where he is then!”

 _it’s… not that simple._ but this time, she sounds hesitant.

the kettle starts to whistle, and seulgi hurries towards it, abandoning the conversation for another day.

_\-----_

it’s nearly a week before she tries her luck again.

“do you think your brother will ever come visit?”

_no._

“why not?”

_if he hasn’t by now, he might not ever._

“why not? that’s not an answer.”

_perhaps he is unable to. it wouldn’t be the first time someone has captured a god. i… dread to think that he simply doesn’t want to. or perhaps, he is like i._

“like you?”

_faded. too tired to care. i’m old. **we** are old. older than time immemorial. everything exhausts me. everything i say makes me tired. every word i try and say burns my soul, turns my bones to ashes. i am so tired. tired of existing. tired of people. tired of everything.  _

“you want—”

“to die.”

“if you’ve tired of people, why have you allowed me to stay?”

“because,” irene’s voice is soft, hoarse from years of disuse, and she’s surprised that irene even tries., “you needed it.”

“so if someone needed you, would you stop being tired?”

“i doubt it works that way.”

“but it is true, isn’t it? you want to be needed. you _need_ to be _needed_. now that we don’t crave certainty from the gods – what are you to us? what are you to yourself?”

irene’s eyes flash, and for a moment seulgi fears that she might be turned into some bear and be sent away, lumbering through the forest before she meets the barrel’s end of some overzealous hunter.

when she _doesn’t_ get transformed into a bear, she presses on, emboldened. “i think you aren’t really tired. you simply _want_. and you’re sad. you are sadder than i am – no, than i've been.” it’s only when she says it aloud that she realises that she isn’t _sad_ anymore, not here, not in this middle of nowhere. “come with me.”

irene’s lips are set in a stubborn line. “i… can’t.”

“you can’t, or you won’t? why are you so afraid to take a step forward? to get out of here? we’re afraid to get hurt, but wouldn’t you at _least_ try?”

she hears her thoughts before irene can stop it, _because i’ve not been amongst mortals for a millennia. because i’m not as i once was. because i am but a vestige of the past, a forgotten memory – you don’t know what it’s like to have lived forever but to be forgotten even as you are alive, for you might as well be dead._

irene sucks in a breath. _they still call out to me, right here, where a village razed to the ground centuries ago. they call out to me, their lost souls, crying, wailing, poor souls that cannot afford the crossing. they call me by a name i once had, long ago, but I still hear them. they’re loud. loud. all i can hear is their anguish and the shout of that soldier who’s telling them to be quiet. i want them to stop yelling and i want myself to be whole again – but if i leave, then what is to become of me?_

“then change it,” seulgi begs, her eyes imploring. “if you languish here any longer, you will truly go mad.”

irene’s eyes widen as she realises that she had forgotten to clamp her thoughts in, _foolish, foolish mortal. i let you seek refuge with me, and this is how you repay me?_

seulgi sticks her chin out, in a sudden and rare demonstration of defiance. “you did not refuse me, and i am grateful. but i need to go home soon. you could come with me. i can bring you out of here. i know the world outside.”

for a long moment, irene is silent. seulgi cannot help but stop and stare at her, her ever so enchanting façade as she waits for irene to reply. irene, whose eyes are dark and inexplicably sad.

“must you really leave?”

seulgi sighs. it’s been nice, here, but… “it’s nearly the end of summer, isn’t it? my friends must miss me. my family’s probably getting really worried. scratch that. my dad is probably going nuts, not knowing where i am. and… i need to go back. i can’t stay here forever.”

irene lets out a sigh, and her voice is quiet as she asks, “is there no other way?”

seulgi tugs on irene's hands. “you _know_ i can’t stay here. but you can come with me.” hesitantly, she adds, “i will save you.”

irene shakes her head, a low groan escaping her before she can hold it in. she looks up at seulgi, her wide eyes glazed with a sheen of tears.

_dozens have tried, and they have failed. what makes you different?_

to that, she has no reply, for the tales have made out heroes, and she is not a hero.

they stare at each other for another moment, and irene sighs again, a heave of a thousand years of solitude.

she’s not sure who moves first, but seulgi gasps when she feels irene’s soft lips against hers. she’s not sure what she expected. That irene’s lips would feel cold? that her lips would be chapped like the texture of her voice?

she’s so, so wrong.

she is kissing irene. oh god, what has she done to deserve this? has she fought for the emancipation of the oppressed in a previous life? has she fought for _anything_ in her current life?

irene pulls apart from seulgi as seulgi lets out a gasp, and as she would later admit, a keening moan of loss.

but irene kisses her again, and all her doubts are sucked into the hallowed recesses of a mind that, with each fierce press of lips, is ignited with the light of the stars.

irene tastes divine.

irene’s face bears a challenge. seulgi doesn’t want to back down and she pushes her face into the crook of irene’s neck, her lips tracing slow kisses across her skin before she bites down, hard, into the thin skin along irene’s collarbone. her hand shifts from its place at irene’s hips and reaches beneath for the heat between her legs, and as she pushes her fingers between her folds all seulgi can think of is _god_ as she seeks a rhythm, a push and a pull, a conduction of their thrumming staccato breaths, and irene all irene can chant is “seulgi, seulgi, seulgi—” the sound of her name jolts her in her haze when she realises that she’s never heard irene say her name aloud before this. it’s always been lingering gazes, unspoken gestures and voiceless thoughts echoing between them. she _cannot_ be distracted, and she returns her mouth to irene’s neck and her fingers continue their dance—

irene gasps as she becomes undone in seulgi’s hands – but gods hate being outdone, and she retaliates by delving her fingers underneath seulgi’s shirt and leaves a searing trail across her ribcage. when she returns to earth, irene doesn’t really ask for permission, not verbally. she’s a god, and she has always gotten what she’s wanted. gods are like men, and they want all that they have not claimed with the ferocity of a winter storm. but perhaps godhood has worn on her. irene slants her head, a question in her eyes.

_may i?_

seulgi just nods, maybe a little too eagerly, but she doesn’t really care. irene’s returning smirk is sharp and crimson before she snakes her fingers between seulgi’s parted legs, rubbing slowly but insistently against the soft skin of her legs before the touches grow feather light, teasing against her outer folds and seulgi swallows a moan. for her, she would scream a wordless song.

before irene, she cannot hope to love the feeling of the collapse of bones and the burning of blood any more than she does in this moment. it is then she knows: you do not fight a god, you submit, and be everything a god wants you to be.

irene _is_ divinity.

\---

sweat-damp, they lie in irene’s bed. moonlight filters in through the window and glances off their skin. in the milky light, seulgi watches as irene presses a kiss against her jaw. for a long moment, all she hears is the fading roar of her heartbeat before irene’s wistful voice sounds in her mind.

with slowing breaths, they inhale the sorrow painted night.

_you may go._

\--------------------

 “Oh my god. Seulgi!” Yeri’s shriek echoes through the apartment. “When the hell did you get back?”

“Erm…” To be honest, she’s not very sure either. She could have sworn… “This morning? Maybe?” Her head hurts, faintly, a dull throb against her temples. She’s sure that the way Yeri’s squeezing her chest doesn’t help matters either and she winces and pries the younger girl off her.

“Oh, sorry!” Yeri’s eyes suddenly fill with tears. “I can’t believe that you’re _back_. You’ve been gone for _days_ and Wendy was taking of calling the police and Krystal’s been combing your usual haunts—”

“Wait, sorry? How long have I been gone?”

Yeri pulls away, giving her a strange look. “Four days! We thought you went home or something without telling us but when we phoned your dad two days ago, he said you’ve not been back since the last time we went over together. But you look like your usual dumb self, so…” Yeri’s wipes at her tears. “Shit. You’re okay, right?”

“Yeah.” Seulgi thinks of the bruises that line her ribs. “Of course!”

“Oh god, I better tell Wendy and Sooyoung that you’re back. They’re going to be so glad you’re back from – wait, where have you been?”

Seulgi bites the side of her lip. “Just. Away.” She’s not really sure where she’s been either, not really. “I’m better though.”

“Better?” Yeri’s brows hitch. “You do… look less like shit.”

“Geez, thanks.”

Yeri’s gaze softens. “You do though. Less troubled. Less upset. I don’t know, if you don’t want to talk about it, it’s okay. But if you’re better, wherever you went or whatever you did, I’m glad.”

“Yeah,” Seulgi says with a small smile, grateful that Yeri isn’t going to pry any further. If _Yeri_ isn’t prying, then the rest wouldn’t. In your own time, they’d say. She’s not even sure how she should start. Does she say that she whisked herself off to a forest, and fell deep into the rabbit hole? Does she tell them of Irene, now nothing to her but a beautiful memory that she refused to stay with? Does she tell them that she never truly wanted to leave, but she never wanted to stay either?

She can’t.

But she finds that none of that really saddens her. Looking at Yeri, her heart is light for the first time in months, and she reaches forward to hug her. If Yeri’s surprised at Seulgi’s uncharacteristic affection, she doesn’t show it and she returns Seulgi’s hug with just a little too much exuberance.

\----------------------------------------

Seulgi doesn’t really know why she’s come to this part of the town when all the locals have warned her against doing so. She’s at the forest’s edge in a foreign country. The bus driver left her at the very last stop, his face surprised as he bids her _good luck, whatever you’re doing there, you’ll need it._ And even then, she had to make a twenty-minute walk before the first buildings came into sight.

Most of the buildings lie abandoned. ancient, crumbling monoliths of a bygone era. Grey, graffiti streaked stone to match the grey sky.

Strong winds that blow hard at her and she shivers. the weather’s turning cold of late.

 _Why is she here_?

Her friends had groaned when they heard that Seulgi wanted to come here. But why? They had asked. There’s nothing in this part of town. It’s on _none_ of the tourist maps. For good reason, Sooyoung had added.

Seulgi had insisted on it. they backed out of it. _your life, I guess_ , they had said. She didn’t mind, honestly. She had tugged on her threadbare black jeans, jacket, and scuffed sneakers before she left the house. The only thing that was worth stealing from her would be her camera, which she had worked hard to save for.

 _And oi, Seulgi, don’t disappear for a few months again. I think going to the embassy to report a missing person case is probably… more trouble than it’s worth, you get me?_  

She makes her way past block after block of grey, occasionally spotting the groups of squatters that have made the abandoned spaces _theirs_ , whatever that’s worth in an empty district devoid of anything vaguely productive in nature. She tries not to pass judgment at the mounds of cigarette butts, empty bottles, and the few empty syringes, but it’s hard. A wave of sadness washes through her at the futility of these acts, and the implied haplessness of the world and everyone in it.

She wonders if these people would be inclined to be photographed. Maybe not. and she’s not about to ask, not when she barely manages to speak the language here. She hurries on, her sneakers splashing against the murky water. She scrunches her nose at the noxious odour of compounds that should never enter your body with the blunt end of a needle, tries not to choke at the stench of the chemical amalgamations.

She doesn’t know how long she’s been walking, but at the edge of the treeline, she stops. Here, most of the air has cleared a little. She can see why – she’s just walked past police post – the lone officer stationed is asleep on his desk, unwilling or unable to do anything about the squalor of his jurisdiction – and a row of buildings mostly razed to the ground. Google tells her that an accidental drug fire razed the structures down way back in 2006, killing the inhabitants within.

Before her stands a half-charred building. She pushes the rusty door open, and it makes the loudest creak she’s ever heard in her entire life. It’s dim inside. She pulls out her phone to turn the torch on. She takes a few tentative steps in, and, confident that the remains of the roof wouldn’t collapse on her, she makes her way to the very last room in the house, her breath trembling. She’s never liked dark and cramped spaces.

Dear god.  

And there she is, squatting amidst the debris.

Here, she looks far smaller than she’s ever looked.

“Hello,” she says, stunned that it _worked_.

Irene looks up. In the darkness, she can’t tell if there’s a twinkle in her eyes, and she’s not about to point her torch directly into her eyes, goddess or not.

“Well, hello to you too.”

Irene gets up, a slight tremulous smile appearing on her face. “You came.” She walks closer to Seulgi. “Wasn’t sure you would.”

“Yeah… well… I had the feeling you’d be here.” She looks around, surveying the ruins and nearly sneezes at the dust. Irene’s not draped in her usual cloths, but the plain aesthetic remains. White shirt, black leggings. She’s still barefoot though.  “So… what’s a girl like you doing in a place like this?”

“Oh, a place like this? You know, just visiting old haunts.”

“But… why… here? Of all places?”

Irene gives a wry smile. “Our lot cannot really venture far beyond what we know. This… used to be where I had a shrine dedicated to me, I suppose. A part of me will always be able to find my way here. Sometimes, I hear those that attempt to seek the old days call out to me from this site. They’re loud, and they do it wrongly. Their hearts are bent in the way I cannot love.”

“ _Here_ , though?”

She imagines a ritual. With blood. A goat. Some dance. Not a pleasant thought. She shudders. “Why not somewhere else?”

Irene shrugs. “It’s simply just so. How have you been?”

Seulgi shrugs in return too. “Okay. Better. Than I was before. Before I… went to your place, I meant. A lot of things still trouble me. But… I’ve been seeing a therapist.” At Irene’s confused look, she explains, “They’ve got people to talk to you when things go badly in your life, or just when you think you need someone to guide you in a better direction, you know?”

“Sounds like the Oracle.”

“What?”

“A pretty girl tells a man that he will succeed at something. Or that he will never be this but will be something greater, in time. It’s very reassuring, for most people. I suppose it must be the same when someone tells you that you will get better. I’m not very convinced that it’s of any good, but all humans like a good tale.” She says this simply, but not dismissively. Seulgi’s not sure that she wouldn’t have strangled her if it was anyone else.

Seulgi sighs. This would be a talk for another day. If there _is_ another day. And if there is one, she would strongly recommend that the goddess make a trip down to her therapist. God knows that she needs them to heal a millennium of isolation and self-loathing.

“But how have _you_ been?”

Irene shakes her head. “It’s been… patchy. Like a haze. After you’ve left, I stayed back home for a bit. Then… somehow, I decided to leave. I left what I’ve known for years and years and years and did not take my deer with me because they shouldn’t ever have to leave the forest. I… my consciousness wanders. One day I am here, and the other I am there, rarely ever _whole_ until I found this old shrine. And I felt… that I _had_ to stay. And so I did.”

Seulgi doesn’t know what to say to that. So she says instead, “You sound a lot better.”

A laugh. “My voice, you mean?”

“Yeah. What else could I have meant?”

Irene sobers up. Her eyes darken and she lowers her head with a slow sigh. “I don’t think I’ve gotten any better. Not like this.”

Seulgi wants to wrap her in her arms and pray that she’d be better, but she knows that Irene will have to deal with _everything_ herself. She’s been tangled up in her own misery for a thousand years. Unravelling that would take a weaver more skilled than a thousand spiders.

But she will try. She is not sure what compels her to think that she _has_ to, but she will.

And so Seulgi makes her offer again. “Come with me.”

Irene’s head shoots up, her eyes wide and startled. “What?”

“Come with me,” Seulgi repeats again, feeling vaguely foolish as pinpricks of déjà vu shoot through her. “I can’t promise that you will ever feel like the entire world again. I definitely _won’t_ be erecting an altar for your sake – heck, if I could afford it I’d pay off all my debt by now – but I’ll help ground you—”

“Seulgi, you… you can’t.”

“Yes, I _can_.” Seulgi says, more fiercely. “I am here now. Better. Not exactly in perfect condition, but hey, neither are you. I can help you. Come back with me, and my friends. You can… live with us. And maybe stay, I hope.”

“But… I can’t…”

“No, you _can_. _Please_. I don’t want to go home and know that somewhere, you’ve cast yourself out and you’re wandering about without knowing _who_ you are.”

Irene’s told her about lost gods. That lost gods are broken. That the last time her consciousness wandered sometime in the early sixties she stabbed a man who drugged a girl barely on the cusp of adulthood at the back of a club, but that as her knife dripped with red she knew she was already _too late_ when she heard the girl crying and sobbing. And that as she stared at her bloodied hands she knew that in this age, she was _powerless_ and could affect no change in the world. That she couldn’t even save one girl before the fact. That she had nothing left to offer a girl, hurting, and alone as rain dripped on her as she lay against the slimy surface of the dumpster.

And that she knew, fully and properly, that there was nothing else for her there. Because she didn’t even know where Dionysus was, could not find someone to help guard the drinks. That her brother was missing and there would be no one to heal a girl when she wanted it to happen. That the hearth had died and there would be no warm blankets to tuck a girl under when she needed it most. All that was left was that in the underworld, and she would be loath to venture into the cold depths below.

She was nothing then, and she is nothing now.

“I cannot.” Irene whispers.

“But… you can.” She’s only known Irene for a terribly short time. “I don’t know why I ran into you that day in the forest, but there must’ve been a reason.”

“ _Sheer_ dumb luck,” Irene rasps, shaking her head hard and _refusing_ to listen.  

“Perhaps. But maybe it’s… I don’t know.”

“Fate?” Her lips twist in a poor mimicry of a smile. “That’s a weird way of spinning it.”

“I don’t know. Maybe it’s yeah, as you said – dumb luck. And my friends say I’m pretty dumb, so maybe it’s _luck_ and _chance_ but… I think I was meant to have you around.”

Honestly, why is she saying this? She’s not particularly sure, but she knows she will never be able to live with herself if Irene is a million pieces forever. Is it responsibility? Duty? Admiration? A newly acquired bleeding heart? Or… It confuses her. But whatever Seulgi is motivated by, she doubts that it matters. Not now, not when she believes that she _has_ to take Irene with her.

“Come on. It’s not like it will hurt you. Or me. Whatever your concerns are.” She reaches for Irene’s hands and Irene nearly jumps.

Irene sighs, deflating and shrinking into her small, small form. “I… am not worthy.”

But more hopefully, _if you_ _want me around—_

Seulgi shakes her head and squeezes Irene’s hands. “You are worth everything,” Seulgi promises. “Always.”

 “Are you sure you’re not just saying that because I’m… a god?”

Seulgi sees a smile that trembles like the waxing moonlight creeping its way to the earth outside. It’s never good to reveal everything to a god. and so, she grins as she says, “Nah. It’s kind of because you’re pretty.”

But to give a god something, to make a god laugh? Now, that’s worth it.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, I might continue this - any continuations / snippets of everything would be more low-mimetic/less... dreamy and what not maybe?
> 
> I kind of want to see which references you guys picked up, so let me know? 
> 
> I am also _terrible _but I will edit this later. (I like editing after re-reading the thing on my mobile after I post, and yes I know I can do it on preview saves but eh.)__


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